Pin-gate for match-machine hoppers



G. LISPENARD.

PIN GATE FOR MATCH MACHINE HOPPERS.

APPLICATION FILED JULY 23,1919.

1,336,247. m Patented Apr. 6, 1920.

27 1 V'YVTOR.

2 ATTORNEY.

i u" m a; a an a;

GEORGE LISPENARD, GE BRGOKLYN, I-TEW "3Z0 oon rona'rlon, or

SSIGNOR T0 H. @c F. MATCH MAOEEIIIE CQRPORATEON 0F NEVI YORK.

'EIN-GELTE FUE- MATGI-lf-IEACHINE HGPPERS.

Application filed July 1519.

1 b all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, Gnonen LISPENARD, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of the borough of Brooklyn, county of Kings, city and State of New York, have invented a new and useful improvement in PinGates for li latch-Machinellioppers, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description. 7

My invention relates to improvements in match machines of the kind in which match sticks or splints arranged in a hopper and fed from the hopper in rows into a carrier which carries them into the parafiin and composition dipping mechanism, and from which they are dis harged as finished matches. In machines of this type a great deal of difficulty has been experienced at the feed station, that is at the point where the splints are fed from the bottom of the hopper to the carrier. The splints under the most favorable circumstances will clog more or less owing to the fact that there will always be some imperfect splints, and slivers or other matter will cause such clogging. -When this occurs it has usually been necessary to stop the machine in order to clear outthe hopper bottom in which is generally a cell or magazine having parallel slots in which the splints drop one upon another in parallel relation. To enable the splints to be cleared out from this point without stopping the machine, a removable front has sometimes been used, and this is not entirely satisfactory although it is better than the old fashioned solid hoppers, but the cells in the magazine must be kept closed at the ends or the splints will become displaced. The object of my invention is to overcome these difficulties and provide a very simple and efficient means for closing the ends of the cells of the hopper so that each cell may be individually opened as required, and thus if there is a clogging in one of the cells it can be opened at the front end, and with a pair of pincers or other tool the splints can be removed so as to clear the cell without interfering with any of the adjoining cells, and thus the working of the machine is not seriously impaired, as only one cell will be out of business, and this only temporarily. This idea can be best carried out by having Specification of Letters Patent.

l-atented Apr. 6, 1921).

Serial l-Tc. 312,705).

a removable pin serve as a closure for the end oi. each cell, although the invention is not limited to this particular construction.

l ieference is to be had to the accompanying drawings forming a part of this specitn cation, in which similar reference characters indicate corresponding parts in all the views.

Figure 1 is a sectional elevation of the feed station of a match machine showing es pecially the hopper and my improved attaclnnent.

Fig. :2 is a front view of the hopper and the pin gates for closing the cells thereof, and

Fig. 3 is a broken detail plan partly in section of the grid or cell construction of the hopper bottom and pin gates thereon.

In the drawings 1 have shown most of a match machine to make my invention clearly understood. As illustrated. the hopper U) can be any conventional hopper and l have shown it containing splints 11 piled one on the other and held in place by a removable weight 12. At the bottom of the hopper is a sticking head comprising in part a slide plate 13 which pushes the lower rows of splints from the bottom of the hopper and into the carrier 14: which is usually a chain of plates, and is driven by a pin-wheel 15, while an abutment 16 is arranged opposite the pinwheel and between it and the hopper to take up the slack of the chain. The slide plate 13 moves with the parts 18 and 19 of the sticking head, and has grooves 17 to remove the match sticks or splints. All of the above is more or less conventional, and this construction can be materially different without affecting my invention, but it is necessary to show it so that the application of my device will be clearly understood.

Across the front end of the hopper is a closing plate 20 which closes the front of the hopper magazine, and this is preferably removable, though not necessarily so, and to provide for removing it I have shown the plate slotted near the sides as at 21 so as to receive binding screws 22 which hold it to the frame 23 at the sides of the hopper. This removable front plate is not here claimed. Extending vertically through the front plate and in parallel relation, are a other in the cells and are thus guided to the sticking mechanism. It will be seen that the heads limit the distance to which the pins 24 extend into the cells 26, so that the pins can be made to extend just to the bottom of the cells and provide sufficient clearance so as not to interfere with the action of the plate 13.

From the foregoing construction it will be readily seen" that if one of the cells 26 becomes clogged it is only necessary to lift the pin-gate, that is the pin 24 opposite the particular cell, and that cell can be cleared out without stopping the machine and without interfering with the action of the other cells. Thus it will be seen that the operator can keep the cells clean without stopping the machine, and that if it is necessary to clean out one cell the capacity of the machine is not materially interfered with.

It is better to have the plate 20 removable as in this way the whole front of the hopper can be exposed if necessary, but ordinarily this is not necessary, and moreover the pins can be more readily assembled in the removable plate and easier placed in position in front of the hopper.

While I have shown vertically movable pins as the simplest and best way of closing the individual cells at the hopper bottom, it will of course be understood that the cells may be provided with other individual end closures without affecting the principle of my invention.

I claim 1. In a match machine having a hopper with splint cells in the lower part thereof in which the splints lie parallel one upon the other, means for feeding the match splints individually from the cells to a carrier, and a separate end closure for the individual cells at the hopper bottom.

2. In a match machine having a hopper with a bottom containing parallel cells in which the splints lie horizontally one upon another, means for feeding the splints from the bottoms of the cells, and a removable end closure for the individual cells.

3. In a match machine having a hopper with parallel splint receiving cells and means for feeding splints from the cells, a pin-gate having removable pins extending across the end portion of each cell and forming a closure for said cell.

4. In a match machine having a hopper with parallel splint receiving cells and means for feeding splints from the cells, a series of removable pins forming the end closures of the individual cells, and means for fixing the position of the pins with re lation to the cells.

5. In a match machine having a hopper with parallel splint receiving cells thereon and means for feeding splints from the bottoms of the cells, a plate extending across the hopper front near the front ends of the cells, and pins extending vertically through the plate and across the ends of the cells thereby forming individual closures for the cells. 7

GEORGE LISPENARD. Witnesses:

WARREN B. HUTCHINSON, HERBERT HUTCHINSON. 

